Clothes wringer



I June 16, 1925.

H. W. DOUGHTY CLOTHES 'WRINGER- Filed April 10', 1923 3 Sheets-Sheet 1 Save/14 607,

June 16, 1925.

H. W. DOUGHTY cno'raas vmtuezn' Filed April 10, 192:.

s Sheets-Sheet 2 "amawto'c June 16, 1925.

H. w;- 'DO'UGHTY CLOTHES wamssn' Filed April 10, 1925.

3 Sheets-Sheet 5 avwe/n coz Patented June 16, 1925. I

UNITED STATES 1,542,439 PATENT OFFICE.

HERMAN W. DOUGHTY, F BINGHAMTON, NEW YORK, ASSIGNOR TO THE NINETEEN HUNDRED WASHER COIvIPANY, OF BINGHAMTON, NEVT YORK, A CORPORATION OF NEW YORK.

CLOTHES WRINGER.

Application filed April 10, 1923. Serial No. 631,059.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, HERMAN 1V. DOUGHTY, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Binghamton, in the county of Broome and State of New York, have in- Vented certain new and useful Improve ments in Clothes Wringers, of which the following is a description.

My inventionrelates to clothes wringers and has particular reference to a safety device in connection therewith.

As is well known, one of the objections to power .driven clothes wringers as they are commonly constructed, is that there is danger of the operator getting his or her hand caught between the rolls and painfully injured. To obviate this, various schemes have been suggested whereby the rolls can be tripped or separated in an emergency. However, none of these, so far as I am aware, has been completely successful.

One object of my present invention is to provide means whereby the rolls of the wringer may be tripped by the operator when desired with the least possible effort and the least possible loss of time.

Another object of my invention is to construct those means in such a manner that upon being tripped the rolls will separate to such an extent that there is no danger of any'part of the hand or arm of the operator being squeezed therebetween.

Still another object is the provision of means whereby upon the tripping and.separation of the rolls both of them are automatically disconnected from the driving power.

Further objects of my invention have to do with'the ease of restoration of the rolls to operative position after they have been tripped, the equalizing of the pressure on both ends of the rolls, and other features which will appear more fully hereinafter.

In the accompanying drawing which illustrates one form which my invention may take I F ig. 1 is a front elevation of the wringer with a part of the frame removed to show the working parts, and Fig. 2 isa sectional view of the structure of Fig. 1 taken on the line 11-11, the rolls being shown in operative position in these figures;

Fig. '3 is a fragmentary view similar to Fig. 1, except that it shows the lower roll as well as the upper provided with a driving gear;

Fig. 4 is a side elevation of the wringer of Fig. 1, but showing the rolls tripped and fully separated;

Fig. 5 is similar to Fig. 4 except that it shows the position of the parts while the rolls are being restored to operative position;

Fig. 6 is a fragmentary top view of the wringer, showing the cover mounting; and

Fig. 7 is a fragmentary sectional View of the pressure adjusting'means.

Referring to the drawing, 10 represents the wringer. frame which may be secured to a'washing machine or other suitable support in any desired manner. The wringer rolls 11,12, are mounted in bearing blocks 13, 13, and 14, 14:, respectively, which are slidably mounted in the frame 10.

The bearing blocks 13, 13, and the upper roll 11 are normally held positively in posi 'tion in the following. manner. The top of each of these bearing blocks is provided with a track or race 15 within which rides the boss 16. Each of these bosses 16 is at the end of a projection 17 extending downwardly from the hinged cover 18 which is normallyretained in the closed position illustrated in Figs. 1 and 2 by means of the latch 19 to which further reference will be made later. As long as the cover 18 is closed, the bearing blocks 13, 13, and the roll 11 will be held positively in position.

For normally maintaining the two rolls in operative relation I provide the spring 20 which is interposed between two bell crank levers21, 22. As shown herein, these bell crank levers rock, respectively, about the pivots 21, 22, upon the abutinents 23, 2-1, which are secured to the frame 10. The free ends of these bell crank levers abut against the lower ends of the bearing blocks 28. These pins 28 bear against the lever 22 which is bifurcatedto permit the assemblage of the parts as shown (Figs. 1 and 7) By virtue of the arrangement just described I am enabled readily to adjust the pressure of the rolls, by a single manipulation, and, as is apparent, the pressure at the two ends of the rolls is always equalized. Furthermore the pressure upon the lower rolls is maintained practically constant irrespective of the distance between the two rolls. This results from the construction and arrangement of the levers 21, 22. i That is, these levers are so arranged that the amount of leverage or mechanical advantage decreases as the rolls are-moved away from each other to compensate for the increase in spring tension resulting from such movement, and vice versa. Thus, as shown in Fig. 1,- the lower roll contacts with the upper roll,and the leverage produced by the levers 21, 22 is represented by the vertical distance between the pivot 22 and the point 28. However, when the lower roll is depressed and the tension of spring 20 is increased by its being lengthened, the leverage of levers 21, 22 is correspondingly decreased, this decrease resulting from the lowering of points 28. Likewise the leverage increases as the spring tension decreases upon the upward movement of the lower rol The power for driving the rolls may be derived from any suitable source, as, for example, an electric motor. This power is ap plied to the power driven gear 30 which normally meshes with the driving gear 31 for the upper roll. If it is desired to drive the lower roll as well as the upper roll, it may be provided with a driving gear 32 (Fig. 3) meshing with the driving gear 31 of the upper roll, the latter being wide enough so that both gears 30 and 32 can mesh with it. The teeth of the gears 31 and 32 are of such design that the usual separation of the rolls caused by passing clothes therebetween does'not throw them out of mesh. I

1 preferably provide a drain board 33 pivotally mounted at 34, 34, to thebearing blocks 14 of the lower roll. This board may be pivotally adjusted to direct the water in either direction. For maintaining it in adjusted position I provide any suitable means, such as the spring plate 35 secured to the drain board at 36 and provided with two holes 37, either one of which will engage the pin 39 in the bearing block 14. To disconnect the plate 35 from the pin, for adjustmentpurposes, the plate is depressed by pressure applied to the projection 40.

. Movement of the plate is restrained, but not prevented, by the rivet 41.

The normal operation of my improved wringer will be apparent from the foreclosed by the latch 19 the upper roll is positively held in fixed position relative to the frame, and the lower roll is pressed toward or against it by the spring 20 which may be adjusted to any desired tension by the thumb nut 26.

\Vhen it is desired to separate the rolls, as in the case of an emergency when the operators fingers have been caught between them, the latch 19 is released by depressing the handle or lever 42 (Figs. 1 and 2). This immediately relieves the pressure between the rolls and, because of the action of the spring 42 (Figs. 1 and 6) the cover immediately opens wide, into the position shown in Fig. 4. In so moving the cover carries with it the upper roll whose hearing blocks, as above described, are connected to the cover through the projections 17 of the cover and the races or tracks 15 of the bearing blocks. This upward movement of the upper roll not only leaves a wide space between the. two rolls in which no part of the operators anatomy can possibly be caught, but also, by separating the driving gear 31 from the power driven gear 30 (and from the driving gear 32 if one be used) it also shuts off all power from the rolls.

The bolts 43 of the frame 10 form an abutment with which the bearing blocks 14 of the lower roll contact when the upper roll moves upward, and thus prevent the lower roll from following the upper roll. Because of this construction'the restoring of the parts to normal position by depressing the cover and upper roll is rendered easy. For until the upper roll touches the lower roll in its downward movementandy 'in restoring them to normal position is to move the .cover manually into the position shown in Fig. 5, and then place latch 19 under the abutment 19 as there shown. The lever or handle 42 which is pivoted to the cover at 44, and to which the latch 19 is pivoted at 45, is then moved in a counterclockwise direction (Fig. 5) until it reachesthe position'shown in Fig. 2. During this movement-the parts 19 and 42 operate as a toggle, and are so designed that the restora- I tion of the parts is effected without material efi'ort. In its normal position (Fig; 2) this toggle is just beyond dead center, with thelatch 19 contacting against the pin 44,'-so that there is no danger of its being accidentally released.

\ When, however, is desired to trip the device, the end of lever 42 is .givena sharp blow, which results, in the parts. 42 and 19 moving about the pin 44 as a simple lever (clockwise direction, Fig. 2), and thus removing the latch 19 from its abutment and permitting the cover to swing up into the position of Fig. 4.

In view of the fact that. the operation of myimproved device has been described as a part of the above description of the device itself, it is believed to be unnecessary to describe it here. Suffice it to say that I have devised a wringer which is particularly well adapted, because of its structure and its adjusting means, to the ordinary wringing operations, and which is also provided with an exceedingly efiicient tripping and restoring mechanism. r

In certain of the claims I have used the term gear. It is to be understood that I use this term not in a narrow sense as applied only to spur gears, but broadly, as covering all kinds of gears, including friction gears, etc.

The terms and expressions which I have employed are used as terms of description and not of limitation, and I have no intention, in the use of such terms and expressions, of excluding any equivalent of the features shown and described, or portions thereof, but recognize that variousmodifications are possible within the scope of the invention claimed.

lVhat I claim is:

1. In a clothes wringer provided with a frame and a pair of rolls, a trip-ping and restoring device comprising a member operatively connected to one of said rolls, a lever pivotally connected to said member, and a latch releasable by said lever and adapted normally to cooperate with said frame to retain said member and the roll to which it is connected in operative position, said latch and lever being pivotally connected to constitute a toggle bywhich said member and roll may be moved into operative position. 2. In 'a clothes wringer provide'd with a pair of rolls, means for resiliently pressing one of said rolls toward the other, compris ing a pair of slidable bearings for said pressed roll, in which the ends thereof are mounted, a pair of levers,- one of said levers being associated with each of said bearings so that onearm of the lever contacts with theybearing, and a single,adjustable, spring device connected to the other arms of'said levers and adapted to cause said levers to exert an equal force on both of said bearings, the angle between the two arms of each lever being such that the eflective leverage thereof decreases as the pressed roll moves away from the other roll, and vice versa.

3. In a clothes wringer, a pair'of rolls, means for normally maintaining one of said rolls in fixed position, means for nori'rially pressing the other roll toward said normally fixed roll, means for releasing said first men tioned means to permit the normally fixed roll to move away from the other roll, means for moving the normally fixed roll away from the other roll upon the release of said first mentioned means, and driving means for driving said normally fixed roll while in normal position, said driving means being automatically rendered inactive when said roll moves away from the other roll.

4. In a clothes wringer, a pair of rolls, means for normally maintaining one of said rolls in fixed position, means for normally pressing the other roll toward said normally fixed roll, means for releasing said first mentioned means to permit the normally fixed roll to move away from the other roll, means for moving the normally fixed roll away from the other roll upon the release of said first mentioned means, and driving means for driving said rolls while said normallyfixed roll is in normal position, said driving means being automatically rendered inactive when said roll moves away from the other roll.

5. In a clothes wringer, a pair of rolls, means for normally maintaining one of said rolls in fixed position, means for normally pressing. the other roll toward said normally fixed roll, means forreleasing said first mentioned means to permit the normally fixed roll to move away from the other roll, means for moving said normally fixed roll away from the other roll upon the release of said first mentioned means, and driving means for driving said rolls through said normally fixed roll while the latter is in normal position, said driving means being automatically rendered inactive when said roll moves away from the other roll.

6. In a clothes wringer, a pair of rolls," releasable means for normally retaining the upper roll in fixed, operative position, resilient means for normally pressing the lower roll upward toward the upper roll, means 'efl'ective only when the upper roll is in operative position for applying power thereto, means for releasing said first, mentioned means, means for elevating the upper roll out of operative position upon. such release, and means for limiting the upward movement of the lower roll'when the upper roll is elevatedr V v 7. In a clothes Wringer, a pair of rolls, releasable means for normally retaining one of said rolls in fixed, operative position adjacent the other roll, resilient means for normally pressing the other roll toward the first mentioned roll, means efi'ective only when said first mentioned roll is in opera- ,tive position for applying'power thereto,

and means for releasing said first mentioned means to permit the movement of said first jacent the other roll, resilient means for normally pressing the other roll toward the first mentioned roll, means effective only when said first mentioned roll .is in operative position for applying power thereto, means for releasing said first J mentioned means, and means for moving said first mentioned roll out of operative position and away from the other roll upon the release of said first mentioned means.

9. In a clothes ,wringer, a pair of rolls, releasable means for normally retaining one of saidrolls in fixed, operative position adjacent the other roll, resilient; means for normally pressing the other roll toward the first mentioned roll, means effective only when said first mentioned roll is in operative position for applying power thereto, meansv for releasing said first. mentioned means, means for moving said first mentioned roll out. of operative position and away from the other roll upon the release I of said first mentioned means, and means for limiting the movement of the other roll toward the first mentioned roll upon such release,

10. In a clothes wringer, a pair of rolls, releasable means for normally retaining the upper roll in fixed, operative position, resilient means for normally pressing the lower roll upward toward the upper roll, a driven gear mounted on the upper roll, a driving gear mounted independently of the upper roll and positioned to mesh with said driven gearonly when the upper roll is in operative position, and means for releasing said first mentioned means to permit the upward .movement of the upper roll out of operative position.

11. In a clothes wringer, a pair of rolls, releasable means for normally retaining the upper roll in fixed, operative position, resilient means for normally pressing the lower roll upward toward the upper roll, a driven gear mounted on the upper roll, a driving gear mounted independently of the upper roll and positioned to mesh with said driven gear only when the upper roll is in operative position, means for. releasing said first mentioned means, and means for elevating the upper .roll out of operative position upon such release.

HERMAN W. DOUGHTY. 

